October 16th and November 12th: The onset of symptoms including a fever, twice in a month. This last Thursday, I picked her up from daycare to find her inside (other kids were playing outdoors) with one of her teachers. Jia was “helping” her gather her classmates’ coats, and she let out a dry cough. Her teacher reported that Jia has been off and on fussy in the afternoon and coughing occasionally. She said that she was afraid that maybe she had a fever, but she hadn’t felt warm to her. Took her home, she was definitely a little fuss ball on the ride home, but once we were inside she was happy as usual. Right before her bath, I took her temperature since she felt a little warm to the touch and her temp was around 101F. Rut-Roh. Our ibuprofen was expired by 2 weeks, so I made a quick call to Jeff and had him stop by the pharmacy on his drive home, and I gave her a dose of the expired stuff (meh, 2 weeks isn’t a big deal) and started her bath. The next day I kept her home from daycare as a precaution despite not having a fever in the morning and she’d developed congested sinuses. Then that progressed to congested coughing, which is still around. We are day 5 of her congestion, with no real great improvement – only a slight improvement from when she started to lose her voice over the weekend and she’s gotten it back about 95%.

I was at my per diem job on Tuesday (kept her home Monday, for a total of 4 days of rest at home) when her teachers told me that Jia had a slight fever of 100F, and though they don’t typically send home kids at 100F (their policy is 101F), they expected Jia’s to spike after her nap if she even had one. I left work early (the per diem job is really flexible and everyone’s really understanding about this type of thing, how nice!) and picked her up about 5 minutes later. She was smiling and trotting over to me in the classroom as I gathered her things, knowing that her pleasant demeanor wasn’t an indication of how well she was feeling during playtime. Got her home, let her acclimate back to her surroundings and play with some toys, drink some fluids and take a dose of motrin (I’m glad she loves the stuff) and she slept hard, for a 4 hour and 6 minute nap. Poor thing. So here we are on Wednesday. No fever, just a max of 99F (temporal) before bed and she’s pretty happy. We’re going to try it again – me going to work. They’re really needing my help tomorrow, so I feel I should be able to work and help out as much as I can unless I hear from Jia’s school that she’s not up for it. All she wants to do is go “outside” and to “playground please” so meh. I’m hopeful. (Monday afternoon all she wanted to do was go to the playground too, but I think it wasn’t the best decision to go)

Other things she’s done (other than catching bugs):

Mealtime Hugs: Sicky little Jia was eating dinner and asking me for help scooping food onto her spoon and so I put my left arm around the back of her chair and used my right hand to help her with her spoon. Little nugget leans backwards to gaze at me and puckers up those sick little lips. I try to put my cheek to her lip level but her little bobble head searches to find my lips. Ha! Guess this is where she gets her bugs, handing out kisses.

“Excuse me Mommy” If she wants to squeeze by, sit next to you in a chair, etc. she’ll say “ess-cuse me mommy” or “ess-cuse me”

Washing Hands: It amazes me every day when I can ask her to hand me something or go somewhere and she’ll go. I think she’s just as happy that she knows what I’m saying and she wants to show me that she knows. So, when I tell her “go to your bathroom and climb up your stool to wash hands” she’ll trot over to her little stool and start working her way up those two steps to her sink.

Peed (twice) on commandon the potty chair. Right before bath, since she’s infamous for sitting on the potty chair then waiting til her feet are submerged in the tub water to start peeing, if she had a semi-dry diaper, I have been encouraging her to try peeing on the potty. Twice so far has been successful, out of about 4 days trying. I’ve learned to make her bath water extra hot, because she likes sitting on the potty for about 10 minutes while we read a book.

Hot Dog Dance: If you have seen an episode of Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, you’ll know the Clubhouse Dance – the Hot Dog Dance. I used to find the song annoying because it was one of those tunes you’d get stuck in your head, but after seeing that she’s learned the dance herself, I really get excited when it comes on to see her face light up and her arms start shimmying to the beat!

Circle Time: She asks me to do “circle time” with her at home, as she grabs a book. She’ll sit down on my lap (the kids rotate in their teacher’s laps during circle time) for us to read or sit in front of me with a book.

Baby: I bought her a Melissa & Doug Mine to Love Mariana doll baby after seeing how “maternal” she has become, with her Lamilly “barbie” doll. I know she loves roll playing with the doll babies at school, so I wanted her to have one at home so my heart could melt as my baby takes care of a baby! So, on her sick day home on November 13th, she got to play with “Baby” (as she’s calling her). She sometimes walks around with her cradled in her arms as she pats Baby’s back and says “shhhh, shhhh”

Dog Eat Dog World:She says “NOOOO!” and points at the doggies disapprovingly whenever they approach her while she’s eating a snack at the living room table. She knows those pugs are after her scraps!

1, 2, 3, 4: She can now count to four correctly. I don’t think she knows what they really mean.

Favorite # is 2.

What do you want for breakfast? Pancakes! How many pancakes? Two!

What floor are we going to? Two!

How many blue squares are there right here? (Three) Two!

She can pick out 1 of an item, and obviously 2, but who knows what she’s thinking!

Wheels on the Bus: She starts humming and singing rhymes around the apartment and Wheels on the Bus is one she loves. She wants us to sing it so she can start doing the hand gestures of the wheels moving, wipers wiping, baby crying and wiping its eyes, shushing, people on the bus going up and down, etc. I mentioned something similar in other WSDW posts, but this one is a regular. That and Twinkle Twinkle and the ABC song.

Indian “Asker”? She’s in the oh-so-great phase of asking for something with gusto and then refusing it immediately when presented to her. This is fun.

Oranges?

here’s oranges.

No.

Mac and Cheese!

OK I have to heat it up!

Mac and Cheese coming? Hot?

Yup. (cools down) here you go!

No!

PineAPPLE!

You want apple or pineapple?

Pineapple!

Here’s some pineapple!

No!

Milk

Here you go.

Noooooooo! (as if to say, I did not ask for poison!!!!)

Bikes: The day before I sent her back to daycare, we needed to go to the ATM to get cash and then take it to the bank to get quarters for laundry. I put her in the jogging stroller and we stopped by the garage to pump air into the tires. She was all happy and eager to go on this excursion. Til she saw the bikes. Then she wanted to bike. She was unhappy to stroller. She wanted to “go bikes!!!!!” and started to throw her things one by one out of the stroller, showing me she was not approving this decision of mine. I explained to her that we were already on our way to the store and we are going to stroller. To that, she got very upset and started sobbing. I caved. I know, I know. My justification was, “oh but she’s sick I don’t want her upset if she’s sick. If she weren’t sick it would be tough luck kid” ….I think. Oh well. So we went biking and she was clapping her hands saying “yaaaaaaay” and smiling as we rode.

Lil Baby Bobble Head: When we go on our bike rides, she bops her head back and forth as I sing nursery rhymes like “If you’re happy and you know it” or “twinkle twinkle” etc. Though it throws off my balance ever-so-slightly, I really enjoy knowing she’s having so much fun.

She’s getting great at blowing that little nose! Real effective good nose-blowing now, that Snot Sucker is getting some good use and those Princess A-Yeh (Anna) Frozen kleenexes are helping soothe that little chaffed nose!

Some Sick Day Pictures:

Happy sick girl

Mei Mei needs to learn to stop snapping at her little sister for hugging and loving on her

Yup Gran, this caterpillar is still a hit!

Mouth-breathing while watching Mickey Mouse Clubhouse

Doing the Hot Dog dance from Mickey Mouse Clubhouse

My Saturday post is already scheduled to publish, so it WILL go live and on time this weekend.

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Written By Jeni, MPH MSN RN

Creator of Little Sproutings, Written by Jeni Taylor, MPH MSN RN.
I'm a nurse, public health advocate, and new mom living in Los Angeles, CA.
I created Little Sproutings to share my experiences as a mom and discuss relevant baby-health topics through well-researched posts to help parents (new, experienced, and expecting) learn the why and how.